The Great Bowel Movement has earned its place in the Inflammatory Bowel Disease community by having a specific mission, distinguised brand voice, and emotional benefits for patients.
One of our brand tenets is ‘conversation’, and because of that, it’s essential that our platform content includes a diverse range of voices. After all, when our goal is to communicate, and help others communicate diseases that are complex and varied, we cannot do this with a restricted perspective.
Our content strategy considers the entire patient journey, from those having symptoms to not yet diagnosed, to those who have traversed a full journey and are itching with empowerment, to the specific conditions that affect caregivers. We identified a range of topics, each with specific messages, to fill out robust content that moves patients along this journey. While this is a ‘softer’ journey than a typical buyers’ journey which ends with a transaction, the benefits of empowerment, confidence, and action can tangibly change the life of a patient, the outcome of care, and the activation of those in their immediate support circles.
We then identified patients from diverse backgrounds and experiences to support these topics, while building them up on a popular patient platform to fill out this patient journey content strategy.
Furthermore, I developed blogging guidelines that supported writers to submit a strong and effective message, while allowing them the creativity to stay authentic to themselves and their own story. These guidelines helped produce extremely engaging guest content, allowed guest writers to reach more patients, all while maintaining the specific brand trust that we have developed with our community.
Because these guidelines are proprietary to The Great Bowel Movement, they are available upon request.
“It wasn’t until months and months after I became very ill with UC that I was able to talk openly about my IBD. Thanks to GBM, I found my voice, and feel confident speaking about my illness to others. Never in a million years did I ever think I would wear a shirt like my “Ask Me” shirt. And for that I’m grateful.”
Message from the IBD Patient Community